Geography of Man
by Northlight
Summary: Zack thinks about the power of words.


Geography of Man (1/1)

_ Title: Geography of Man (1/1)  
Summary: Reflections about the power of words.  
Characters: Zack.  
Rating: PG13.  
Disclaimer: Cameron and Eglee.  
Date: May 6-7,12, 14, 2001._

He had stolen a car somewhere, details of time and place lost to time. He remembers that it was blue, rust edging along the doors and the trunk, creeping decay. And he can't remember where he was, who he was that day, but he knows that there was a cigarette burn on the driver's seat--a small hole, charred around the edges. His thigh had hidden it from sight, but he'd felt it beneath him, hot through the material of his jeans. There had been a school-bag on the passenger's seat. Untouched for hours as he drove--running, running, wild flight and fear is a constant and the specifics are no longer of any note--he'd pulled into a shadow coated parking lot to consider his options in stillness. He can't remember why, but he knows he opened the bag. 

'Maria--Love you. Have a wonderful day!--Mom,' he'd read the note tucked in lunchbag, crumpled it up and let it fall into the opened ashtray. Riffled through the bag as he peeled away at the wrapper carefully folded around neatly quartered sandwiches. He can't remember what kind, and it is suddenly important to recall that detail. Peanut butter, he finally decides--peanut butter and raspberry jam on white bread. Mouth sticky with peanut butter, he'd leaned back in the seat, flipping through the books he had pulled free from the school-bag (blue, he remembers that it was blue with white lettering. A zipped pocket in the front, and more pockets within that and there had been tampons, keys, spare change and a bottle of apple flavoured lip gloss). 

Poetry. His hand had landed on a poetry book, and he can remember flipping through it, inhuman eyes easily finding dark marks and giving them meanings even in the absence of light. He had known an artist once, a poet whose work has been burned into his brain: Duty. Discipline. Mission. War is art, and he had smothered a sharp bark of laughter against his palm because if war is art, he's an artist. 

They tried to make him think in straight lines and sharp angles, a neat and compartmentalized soldier's mind. Thoughts curve and twist, loop and swirl, wind through his head. Small town nowhere, and he had rented a room and some breathing space. There was a white mug with a gold rim, red letters painted onto the smooth surface: Class of '09. Memento of a happy day, a marker in someone's life, and they hadn't soiled clean whiteness with coffee or tea stains. There had been pens and pencils rattling around inside of it--red and black and blue ink, unsharpened pencils that gleamed with bright colours, yellow pencils ground down to stubs. He had sat at a kitchen table, sunlight warm against the table and his hands atop it. Paper before him, and he had tapped at emptiness with an uncapped black pen. Sunlight crept across the table's wooden surface and he had risen. He stood at the sink, lighter held to the bottom of a blank sheet. A layer of grey ash at the bottom of the stainless-steel kitchen sink, and he had washed it away with a hard spray of cold water. 

There had been a girl, once. She had told him that he might be flesh and blood, muscle and bone, but he stopped where most peoples' spirits began. Empty, she had called him, empty of anything real and soft and human. He had been young, then, and his curving, twisting, looping thoughts had painted a picture--the top of his head cut open, swung open so that careful amounts of duty, discipline, mission could be poured into empty cracks. He thinks that she was wrong--he's more full of emotion and thoughts than his body can handle. All of his thoughts, all of his feelings come out sounding the same--sharp and hard and angry, and he remembers that old thought, Lydecker pouring himself into his cracked head. 

He's bleeding, a hot red rush of blood against his hands--they're strong, his hands, capable, and they can't hold his blood inside his body no matter how hard he presses against his flesh. A wet squelch of torn flesh and meat beneath his pressing hands. His shirt is wet with blood and it sticks to his wound. Blood will dry dark and stiff against the material and thoughts are fuzzy in his head and he wishes for a moment that he hadn't worn white today. 

He's on a street, in the dark, and there are people around him. They walk around him, step around him as he weaves, keep their eyes straight ahead not turning their heads to look at him even when he collides with them, bumping shoulder to shoulder. There are street-lights, yellow pools of light against the pavement. He skirts around the light, hunched over and shambling through the darkness (he remembers a spotlight flaring to life behind him, seeking, seeking, the sound of bullets). The next light has been broken, and he's cold, cold, cold, cold and he hurts. 

Soldiers die. All the time. Uselessly. Violently. Take any moment, and there is a soldier somewhere in the world--some man or woman or child and they're dying and the vast majority of the world doesn't know and doesn't care and wouldn't care even if they knew that guts and brains and blood are spilling out of warm bodies towards the outside. He's dying right now, right here. He could crumple right now, let the weight of his body carry him towards the ground. His legs would fold beneath his body, one arm flung out, the other still curled around his wound. He would sigh, breath rattling in his throat and then he would go still. He could do that. 

Soldiers aren't supposed to wish. Soldiers are meant to be solid, sensible men and women who believe in carefully plotted plans, training, skill and timing. Sometimes, he wishes. He wishes that he had been born a poet, that words came to his lips easily and that they belonged to him and were not simply the echoes of a man he hated. The others used to recognize caring in his orders. Your position has been compromised (I don't want you to get caught). Family isn't an option (I don't want to see you get your heart broken). I gave you a direct order! (I love you). Exposure to the outside world has made his love sound hard and uncaring, something to wince away from, and he doesn't know how to regain what he lost to easy words and open emotion. 

He thinks that love is used too freely, said easily and quickly, is as common as items printed on a grocery list. There was a woman, once, and she had smiled and wound her arms about his neck. She had brushed her lips against his and told him that she loved him. She hadn't known him at all. Breathing a sudden agony, his steps dragging across pavement, he thinks that he's never had those words directed towards him by those he has most wanted to love him. He wonders if they love him, if he is more to any of them than a shared history and common demons. 

Thoughts twist, whirlwind fast, shatter apart. His head is light, feet heavy. The world blurs against his eyes and he sees darkness. His eyes are closed, and he doesn't remember the fall of his eyelids. They peel open and he finds himself on his knees. A hand fall forward, open palmed against the street, sharp pebbles digging into his flesh. They are strong, his hands, capable, and his left one is twitching and trembling against the street and he can't make it rise to join its fellow in catching rushing blood. 

He wishes. . . he wishes more than he has any right to. He wishes that they had a normal life. He wishes that he had been able to protect Jack and Eva, Brin and Ben and Tinga. He wishes for safety. He wishes that he were a poet, that he had known how to shape emotion into words, how to let his family know that he loves them with every bit of strength he possesses. He wishes that he had said "I love you," where the words could be heard by those who most needed them. 

He can feel himself falling, his body impacting with the ground. His hand trembles against blood and torn flesh, stills. Breath catches in his throat, trickles past his open lips. 

~end~ 


End file.
